


Ground Rules

by youheldyourbreath



Category: Gotham (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-31
Updated: 2017-01-31
Packaged: 2018-09-21 01:55:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,978
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9526748
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/youheldyourbreath/pseuds/youheldyourbreath
Summary: Set after the season three winter finale, Bruce and Alfred have gone to work, throwing themselves into training like never before.  When Selina hears what happened with Jerome she disrupts that training.





	

He kicked. Alfred punched. Bruce dodged the assault and swung his fist to contact with the side of Alfred's face. His butler went down. 

A flash of red passed Bruce's eyes. He was no longer in his training room with Alfred nor Wayne Manor at all. Bruce was back at that carnival in the hall of mirrors. His vision twisted like a fun house mirror, contorted and scary and unnatural. He could vaguely hear a laugh as if in the distance and Jerome's face was there. It was as mangled and dysfunctional, sown together with staples, as the maniac's insides. Bruce yelled and threw his whole body against the phantom Jerome. His punches had an undercurrent of rage. 

He was pinning him down. Jerome was trapped beneath his body as he landed punch after punch to his face, tearing it apart from where it was lamely stitched. 

Alfred's voice broke through the trance, "Master Bruce. Sir. BRUCE!"

When Bruce's vision cleared Alfred's face was bloody and raw under Bruce's hands. He stumbled off of his butler and leaned against the wall, his eyes stinging with sorrow. "Alfred. I-I, I didn't mean to..."

The older man climbed to his feet and flinched, "You need to get that temper of yours under control, sir. That's the third time this week."

The bruises Bruce had inflicted on his butler were starting to pile up. His arms and face were littered with Bruce's lashing of agony. 

"I know," Bruce tried to control the wavering in his voice, "I just, I see him. Every time I close my eyes he's there. And he's hurting all those people and I want him to suffer. I want him to suffer the way they all-"

Alfred calmly interrupted, "The line, Master Bruce."

Bruce sucked in a breath through his nose. A mantra of words not yet a week old came out, "I will not kill."

The Wayne Manor butler stepped toward his ward and demanded, "Again."

"I will not kill," the promise came out stronger.

Alfred nodded and slapped a hand on Bruce's shoulder. The presence was calming and fatherly. It was strong and, thankfully, still there. He didn't want to think about what would have happened if those goons had gotten to his butler before Officer Gordon had arrived. His life would have been catastrophe. Alfred was all he had left now. After he lost his parents. 

Selina was as good as lost to him now, too. He visibly flinched at the thought of her. Like the image of Jerome's face taunting him, Bruce could also not escape the memory Selina's eyes prickling with tears, her voice demanding that he fight her. Not her, he had wanted to plea, never her. 

Bruce collapsed into a nearby chair. He put his face in his hands and he could hear Alfred tentatively joining him, "Master Bruce?"

The teenager's eyes chanced a glance at his butler and choked out, "They nearly had you, Alfred. And if I lost you...I'd have no one."

Alfred seemed to stutter, trying to find his footing, trying to think of the people that Bruce had in his life but the boy knew he would come up empty. Bruce was alone. No family. No real friends, they all either left him or turned out to be some kind of homicidal maniac. No support system. He was forged in loneliness. His only true outlet of light had been Selina. His only real family had been Alfred. Those two were there for him.

And after losing Selina, the thought of losing Alfred had incapacitated Bruce. Nearly driven him to cross a line he would never come back from. A line he knew now he could never, ever cross.

Alfred scooted his seat closer to Bruce's and he felt the need to look away, hide his face. "Master Bruce," Alfred tried, "You are becoming an extra ordinary man. And I am so proud of you. If something happens to me you will carry on because this city NEEDS Bruce Wayne. You are as necessary to this city as a heart is to the body. And one day, one day, mate, you will see that."

"And what about what I need?" Bruce hated how sad and lost his voice sounded.

"I'll always be with you even when I'm not, Master Bruce. And Miss Kyle...well, she'll come 'round."

Bruce shook his head, "You didn't see her Alfred. She was so angry. I've never seen her that mad." He paused. "She hit me."

"Damn nasty little girl-" Alfred interrupted.

"Stop it. She was devastated. She'd lost her mother after she'd only just gotten her back. She was lashing out."

Alfred picked at his vest with an air of impatience with his ward, "Yes, well, she didn't need to lash out at you, now did she?"

Bruce fondly smiled at his butler, "I dodged everything else. Just like we'd been practicing." His gaze fell to the floor, "That was it, though, Alfred. I could feel it. She'd just turned it all off. It took years for me to get her to open up and in one singular moment every wall I had ever torn down was reconstructed. She was lost to me."

He knew how much Alfred hated talking about his relationship with Selina. On more than one occasion he'd been dismissed or brushed off for even trying to bring her up. But today Alfred was silent and attentive. He was listening and that was when Bruce knew that what had transpired between himself and Selina really was an ending. Alfred would only listen if it were something of actual consequence. Pain struck Bruce fast.

After a moment of silence, Bruce finally found the courage to say the words that frightened him, "It's really, really over, isn't it?"

Alfred hesitated, "Yes, I'm afraid it sounds like it, sir."

Bruce nodded, trying to banish all thoughts of the carnival, nearly losing Alfred and actually losing Selina from his mind. He stood from his chair swiftly and nodded once more, almost trying to will himself into being fine. Bruce Wayne would be okay because he simply had to be. "If you don't mind, Alfred, I'm heading up to bed."

The butler's voice flooded with worry, "Shall I make you some tea or perhaps-"

"No," Bruce said firmly, "I'll, um, I just want to go to sleep. It's been a long week."

"Of course, sir."

\--

Bruce slammed the door to his room shut, the petulance of a teenage boy shining through. He tore his shirt off and his dark jeans were tossed into his hamper. Crossing to his closet, he pulled out a light pair of pajamas and changed. Putting on something other than black felt strange to him. Vulnerable. Like people could see him clearly in something that did not blend into the night. He wanted to be a shadow. Light blue was hardly discreet. 

As he buttoned his pajama shirt he briefly considered tossing out all of the color in his closet. He didn't need it. He didn't want it. Those clothes belonged to another life. One where parents did not get gunned down in an alleyway. 

He crawled into his bed and turned his back to the window and waited for sleep to take him. It did not come. He didn't like sleeping at night anymore. One had to stay vigilant in the dark. 

His eyes remained staring at his wall for what seemed like hours until he heard the telltale sound of his window screeching open. Bruce scrambled to his feet taking a fighting stance. 

"Bruce?" a relieved voice called out into the darkness.

Bruce lowered his fists, "Selina?"

"Oh thank god," she hissed and launched herself into the boy's arms. Bruce stumbled backward but kept them firmly upward. After a moment of confusion and surprise he pulled Selina against him hard. His hands carded into her curls and found purchase at the back of her head. They seemed to sway in each other's embrace. It was intense and fragile the way that all teenagers bent to their emotions.

He finally released her when she began to pull away. His hands dropped to his sides in shame and she watched his eyes with a pretty blush dominating her face. "I needed to see for myself," she whispered.

"See what?" he countered.

"That you were okay," her voice was stronger. "I heard about what happened with Jerome but since it all went down you've been nearly impossible to get to. The GCPD has cops surrounding the whole place. I asked Gordon to let me see you but he said nobody was allowed up to the house."

Bruce nodded, "Alfred's rules. He wanted some privacy while I-" he searched for the right word, "-readjusted." 

Without thinking, his hand went to caress the three staple wounds that were healing just above his wrist. Selina's eyes caught the impulse and she grabbed for his arm, squinting and inspecting the wound. She looked like she was restraining an impulse of her own. "He did this to you?"

"Yes," Bruce said, trying to stand as tall as he could in his ridiculous light blue pajamas. 

Selina's eyes remained on the wound until she pulled his arm to her mouth and kissed each scar. Then her eyes were fixed on his own. Bruce shuttered.

She dropped his arm to his side and stepped in close. This time her hands went in his hair. Her eyes were searching his face as if to memorize it, to check and see that every single piece of him was still in place. That the only part of him that Jerome had mutilated had been those three risen staple marks on his arm. How could he tell her that what scar he had left most on Bruce could not be seen, it lived in him now?

"You're okay," she whispered. She sounded like she was reassuring herself. "When I'd heard what happened nobody knew if you were okay or not. Last people saw of you was when he'd had you strapped up to that pole. And then the police busted in. And that was it. Turned into chaos, I heard. I was afraid he'd gotten you. And the last thing I would've said to you would have been..." She didn't finish that sentence. Bruce was aching to know every thought she possessed. He wanted to know what she had thought when she had found out about Jerome, if she had cried for him. He gathered not. Selina was far too strong to break down for anyone, much less him. But the idea of his death had shaken her and that gave him hope that maybe this wasn't over. Maybe he hadn't lost her after all. 

"Selina," Bruce said softly, his hands reaching for her shoulders for some contact, "I'm okay. I, uh, I can handle myself."

Her eyes lit up and she looked at him like she had never quite seen him before. They were the same. He had told her that months ago and she hadn't believed him. But now, with her hands in his hair and his own hands bracing her shoulders, she seemed to see a Bruce beneath the boy in that alley. Her face melted into understanding of something he didn't quite know yet himself. 

"Yeah," she mumbled, cupping his face, "Yeah, you can. God-" she breathed out, "-you're okay."

Weakly, he said, "Honestly, I'm surprised you care. After that fight I thought we were done for-mph."

Selina kissed him, then, crushing all of his unspoken words into her mouth. "Shut up," she snapped, pulling him impossibly close. This kiss was unlike any they had shared before. It wasn't quick and embarrassed or shy and polite. It was fevered and desperate and pulsing with reckless teenage desire. Bruce wanted and wanted so much. Each touch from her seemed to burn him. 

They fumbled backward onto his bed and she let out a sassy retort against his lips, "Can you really feel the difference between Egyptian cotton and regular old cotton?"

"Selina," Bruce groaned impatiently, "I don't wanna talk about thread count." His hands bruised at her waist, urgent and demanding for everything she wanted to give him. He was a starving man granted food. He was a thirsty man given drink. He was a teenage boy with a beautiful girl who he adored writhing beneath him on his bed. He was hardly in the mood for polite conversation.

She shoved at his chest and kissed him harder but did not stop speaking, "I'm just saying, it doesn't feel all that different."

"Sure it does," he talked around her mouth, trailing his kisses to her jawline, "It's feels crazy different."

She sighed and arched her body up against his. A sweet, small noise that sounded too fragile to be coming from Selina Kyle escaped her lips, "It really-- ohmygosh-- really doesn't."

He growled back, nibbling at her neck that tasted strangely sweet, "Why did we wait so long to do this?"

"I figured you were too polite to want your feathers ruffled," Selina sighed, her legs folding around his waist to pull him even closer still.

"I'm still a guy," he panted into the crook of her neck.

"Sometimes," Selina groaned, her hips canting against his own, jeans against his ridiculous blue pajama bottoms, "Sometimes I'm not so sure."

Bruce felt like he was experience the most spectacular agony with every roll of Selina's hips. He knew they could be doing more than this with less clothes but he couldn't, for the life of him, imagine it feeling any better than this. He could not imagine it getting any better than the way it felt right now. 

Selina clawed at his back and he hissed, "Claws away, Cat."

"You're not fun," she yelped when he landed a very frantic thrust between her thighs. His pants were growing too tight to be comfortable. He wanted them off, he wanted hers off. He wanted and wanted again and again. The more they moved against each other, the more they wiggled and kissed one another, the louder they became. Bruce knew he couldn't help it. It was all too intense to remain quiet. Maybe that would come with practice, being able to control himself, but Bruce doubted it. He was a very in control person. It was only Selina that could make him lose his mind.

Somewhere in the haze of ludicrous, teenage dry humping Bruce heard Selina keening his name. 

And then he heard someone else say his name more sharply with an edge of anger. "Master Bruce." Alfred's voice came from beyond the door. 

Both teenagers went still and panted into each other's open mouths. With a soft kiss to her lips, Bruce called out, "Yes, Alfred?"

"I think it's time Miss Kyle went home, don't you think?"

Selina shook her head and nuzzled into his neck like a cat. Her hands played with his hair and she teasingly rolled her hips against his. He groaned and bumped his own hips back against her own. She bit her lip and he swallowed the impulse to kiss it. 

"Master Bruce," Alfred yelled, a hand slamming on Bruce's door, "Don't ignore me. Send her on her way, will ya?"

Bruce captured her mouth in one more fevered, desperate kiss before he yelled back to his butler, "Fine. Alright."

The teenagers waited a moment before Selina grabbed a fist full of his hair and yanked him back into a kiss. Bruce's throat rumbled and he was rolled over onto his back. Selina's braced her hands on either side of his head, her hips at work once more against his own. 

Their kisses were frantic and edging on something dangerous when Alfred slammed on Bruce's door once more. "I said send her home, sir. Not wait until I've shut up to go back at it." The two teenagers groaned in frustration and Bruce could hear the impatience in Alfred's tone, "Don't you two get snippy with me. Now you either send her on her way, Master Bruce, or I'll come in there."

Bruce grabbed Selina's hip protectively, "No! No, don't do that. We're done. She's going."

There was a beat of silence where Bruce could almost imagine Alfred smiling, "Very good, Master Bruce. I'll wait out here until she's gone, then."

Selina grabbed a pillow and threw it at Bruce's door, "Alfred, you stick in the mud."

"Miss Kyle," Alfred snipped, "I don't need any more children to be taking care of presently, thank you very much."

The implication made Selina's cheeks light up red and she stole off of Bruce's hips. The teenager sat up in his bed and watched her try and right herself. Her hair and her clothes that were now crumpled by his hand. His lip twitched but he did not smile. He was in control again. 

"We'll finish this some other time, B," Selina purred.

Alfred's voice boomed from the other side of the door, "No you will NOT."

She grinned and stole out his window. As soon as she had arrived she was gone. Bruce flopped back on to his pillow and called out, "She's gone, Alfred."

"Very good, sir." There was an awkward beat of silence. "Good night."

"Good night," Bruce said meanly. He knew Alfred was looking out for him but he felt like a drawn out string that was about to break. Selina had wound him all up. Yet, in spite of that, he finally did let himself smile. Because maybe he hadn't lost her after all. Maybe, just maybe, she was going to stay. 

And with her and Alfred and whatever he was going to do with his training he could make Gotham City better. He could be the hero they needed. The hero he had needed that day in that alley.


End file.
